Friday Squid Blogging: Squid Facts on Your Phone – Source: www.schneier.com

Clive Robinson • April 25, 2025 11:30 PM

@ Bruce, ALL,

More “Internet Of Things”(IoT) being “tanked”

Some may remember “Nest” from before the Big G consumed them like a greedy child with a chocolate bar. As it really was not that long ago.

Well come this Sept Google is totally dropping support for the UK & Europe Nest Thermostats and the US is loosing support for the thermostats but Google are allegedly offering discounts on “upgrades”.

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/04/google-ending-support-for-older-nest-thermostats-will-stop-selling-nests-in-europe/

This IoT “End Of Life”(EOL) by corporate Dictate” is reducing product life times towards the span of the warranty or less (Amazon I’m looking at you…).

I’ve been asked in the past why I don’t do “Voice Assistants” and electronics controlled from a mobile phone… Well aside from Amazon killing an IoT device within 6 months and the entire lack of security in IoT, I oft mention the European Directive on “Waste Electronic and Electrical Equipment”(WEEE). Which is supposed to stop what Cory Doctorow calls “Enshitification” of such goods.

But consider on a couple of walls in my home I have Thermostats to control the pumps in my central heating that follow an electrical timer switch. As an independant pair for the upstairs and likewise the downstairs they have both been working quietly and unobtrusively for over 40years and still work today… I can not remember how much I paid for them it was probably less than 10UKP, so they have more than paid for themselves in that time.

But I do remember they only took a half day to replace the original downstairs untimed thermostat with a new timer and thermostat and install a “back box” and timer and thermostat upstairs with the hard part “pulling through and splicing in” a “frost override” from a thermostat in the porch (technically you are nolonger allowed to do a “wired OR” with mains wiring in the UK so I’d have to rewire if I ever upgrade). It’s been suggested to me that I should replace with a “Smart Heating” device to which I giveca hollow laugh and shake my head sadly, because,

“New does not imply better.”

More accurately these days it actually means “worse” a lot worse…